Sunday September 24, 2006

Today was a good day at The Journey. It was a great day as we dove into the Word about developing a mobile faith that moves and grows with us, and there was a great spirit of participation and worship in both services. We also had eight first time visitors with us, which is always tremendous, especially as most of them seemed to really enjoy and be engaged in the services.

The worship was good, specifically as we introduced the song In Me by Casting Crowns. I believe it was well- received, especially by the folks in the second service! It is a song that is based upon letting Jesus Christ do His work in our lives, especially because His work often times seems impossible for us to accomplish - but "when I'm weak, You make me strong. When I'm blind, You shine Your light on me 'cause I'll never get by living on my own ability..." Since we are in the series, Discovering the Possibilities of Faith, this song is the perfect emphasis. It is all about "the power of Christ in me."

The message today was tough to prepare, and quite frankly, I was nervous as I prepared it as to how it would come across (too textbook-ish, too technical), but it came off well and was received well. Our desire at The Journey is to build a safe place of faith exploration, and to build a faith where faith moves forward. You see, the one thing I didn't emphasize (and should have, but it will be emphasized in small groups) is that we want you to explore your faith which means moving forward, not being stagnant. It is the only way to live the Christian life. It is so much better than building a stagnant faith, and thus, a stagnant church. Stagnant kingdoms don't move forward.

It was great to have the visitors we had with us, and God continues to add to our numbers both in people who have been looking for a church home as well as new believers. Yesterday, we had a woman raise her hand that she prayed with me to receive Christ (which was AWESOME!) and I connected with her after the service, as well as hooked her up with a discipler. The other visitors all seemed genuinely enthusiastic about coming back, so we continue to see the Lord add new people.

Our attendance was 126, which is definitely lower for this time of year as we were missing ALOT of our regulars from the second service. But if you missed it, you WANT to pick up a copy of yesterday's message and find out what we mean when we say that The Journey is on a mission, traveling toward God...

Next week we will discuss the third part of our mission, what it means when we say we are traveling to reach our culture. You do not want to miss it!